March 6, 2011 Land cruising…and a manatee at last

We began our trip from California mostly alone, feral and loving it. We voluntarily gave up this independent life when we rejoined our NorCal Airstream pod in New Orleans, and again at Tallahassee when we joined the larger group for the Florida Fantasy caravan. We have continued to enjoy our time, with the usual pluses and minuses of small-group travel. The leap to our large cruise ship made us more like a pair of wildebeest in a herd of thousands. This wildebeest can take thousands of people in close proximity and ordered times for doing things only so long, and I’m glad to be back with my smaller pod of Airstreamers and ready to hit the road again.

Our cruise ends where it began, at Port Canaveral; the Disney and Carnival ships beat us to port.

What did we think of cruising? This was better than our last trip to this region on Princess, but I personally prefer land cruising to sea cruising by a factor of 10-to-1. And I prefer Marcia’s cooking to cruise cooking at about the same ratio, and acknowledge that she deserves a break more often than every other week, and so do I. The good parts of this cruise: great service, nice people, some relaxation, and good entertainment. The not-so-good parts: too many people, too much merely good food, too much selling, too few ports considering miles traveled, expensive and disappointing excursions, and did I mention too many people? (Marcia would not be so harsh, so talk to her for a more measured perspective.)

Manatee tail?

Mother and offspring manatee.

Looking for manatee.

From this birding trail we saw our 101st and 102nd alligators.

We clear customs and are back in our camp well prior to noon. After comparing notes with those who skipped the cruise, Marcia and I eat a small lunch and head for the Merritt Island National Wildlife Refuge. This is huge – 140,000 acres, land acquired by NASA partly as a buffer for the Kennedy Space Center. As we drive around we can see we are very close to the vehicle assembly building, various launch facilities, and the shuttle landing field.  In a manatee viewing area we see our first manatees – a mother and youngster moving slowly up the dirty waters of a canal.  Moving into the shrubbery for a better view, I receive my first mosquito bites of the trip.

Dinner at a wonderful casual restaurant in Titusville specializing in shell food - Dixie Crossing.